Lost Stars
by plomeeksoup
Summary: The Doctor and Clara are pulled into a parallel world. Cybermen, mermaids, and Rose Tyler await them on the other side.
1. Chapter 1

**AN:** This is a Doctor and Rose reunion fic. I'm not sure how far down the romantic reunion vortex I'm going to take this. There will be sweet moments. I think Twelve is perfectly capable of being sweet when it suits him but I want to be as true to the characters as possible so please don't expect like chocolates and fancy dress. Expect awkward adventures! This is set before the end of Season 8, after _Mummy on the Orient Express_ and before _Dark Water_.

...+++...

Clara sat curled up in the console room arm chair idly flipping through a few books she had pulled from the nearest bookcase. One of the largest was full of star maps and the margins were filled with the Doctor's familiar loopy script. The pictures were beautiful, silver embossed stars on vast fields of rich inky blue. The Doctor himself was across the room scrawling numbers across his chalkboard muttering under his breath about equations and constants and singularities. She was never quite sure who he was talking to: her, the TARDIS or himself.

"Are you almost done Doctor?" she called. "It's been hours and you promised to have me home ages ago. At this rate I should have brought my grading."

The Doctor turned to look at her chalk poised in midair. "Nearly done Clara, just calculating a few more adjustments to the turbulence controls. That last take off was a little bumpy for my taste." He paused, squinting his eyes at her. "Then off you pop to see the gym teacher."

Clara frowned. "Maths," she responded automatically.

"Yeeees," the Doctor replied slowly, "Very good. That's what I'm currently trying to do. So please a little quiet while I concentrate."

Clara rolled her eyes and turned her attention back to the other book in her lap. She had found it shoved under a stack of papers on the bottom shelf. It was a large illustrated copy of Grimm's Fairy Tales. Someone had lovingly colored all the pictures and filled in the margins with twisting vines and vibrant roses. On the front page in cramped precise script, it had read - _'For Susan, on her 8th Birthday. - Grandfather'_ Clara blinked and read it again.

"Doctor?" she called, question obvious in her voice, fingers tracing the lines of the signature. A shrill ringing broke the silence of the console room before the Doctor could answer. Clara jumped, startled, and the book slid from her lap flipping open to the last page. The Big Bad Wolf gazed up at her, large menacing eyes painted over with brilliant polished gold that flickered dark and light, reflecting the wavering light of the console room. There was something off about the image, the wolves eyes were too piercing, the shadows too deep. She shivered and flipped the book shut. The ringing continued.

"Clara could you answer that?"

"Why do I have to answer it. I'm not your secretary." After a few more rings of the phone and no response from the Doctor she sighed dramatically and marched across the room to answer the persistent ringing.

"I still don't know why you even have a phone. You're a posh alien from the future, I didn't think that they would have phones in the future. Thought they would have moved on." Clara mumbled.

"It's a police call box Clara. It can't very well not have a phone can it?"

"What do you want me to say?"

"I don't know take a message!"

"Hello?" She was meant with silence and then suddenly a sharp burst of static and jumbled words. She tried again,"Hello? I'm very sorry I can't make out what you're saying." Pressing the phone closer to her ear, she strained to pick out any intelligible words. She frowned, it sounded like Doctor, bay, void, and shielding maybe.

"Who is it?" the Doctor called out.

"I don't know! It's all static, like the call can't quite come through."

"Really?" The Doctor, interest finally piqued, but the chalk down, and wiped his hands on his coat front leaving faint streaks of white dust in their wake. "Reception on that phone should always be crystal clear, best data plan in the universe!"

Clara waved at him to stop talking so that she could listen. The phone suddenly went silent. "Hello?" she asked tentatively. Two distinct words emerged from the silence, followed suddenly by the dial tone.

"Well what did they say," the Doctor demanded.

She put down the phone, confused. "Just two words, Bad Wolf." Her stomach dropped as she watched all the color drain from the Doctor's face. "Doctor? Are you all right? What does Bad Wolf mean? Didn't the other you, the older looking you... well the even older looking you, say something about that when..." She watched with wide eyes as the Doctor frantically ran to the console and began pushing buttons. "Doctor?"

Abruptly the lights switched from cool blue to burning red and the deep sound of a bell reverberated through the ship. Clara felt it toll in her bones. The TARDIS lurched sideways and she nearly fell, just managing to jolt forward and catch the edge of the console. "Doctor! What's happening!"

"It's the cloister bell," the Doctor yelled over the din of the TARDIS' engines, which had suddenly sprung to life.

"Don't be daft I know that! What does it mean!?" Clara yelled.

"It means we are going to see an old friend and hopefully we won't be destroyed in the process," the Doctor snapped back.

Clara held onto the hard edge of the console watching as the Doctor scrambled, pushing buttons and pulling levers. His motions were manic and he sounded worried but there was a light in his eyes, he seemed... well excited. The TARDIS lurched again and her hands slipped, the floor rushing up to meet her.


	2. Chapter 2

**AN:** Let me know what you think!

Clara opened her eyes. The Doctor's face floated above her, a bit fuzzy around the edges.

"Clara are you all right?" His voice echoed oddly in her head, and she watched fascinated as his thick brows furrowed together in concern. His eyebrows really were quite magnificent, she thought idly. "Clara?"

She blinked and her eyes cleared. Groaning she set up, hand cradling the back of her head checking for any tender spots. "I'm alright," she asserted, her brain kicking back into gear. "Just got bumped around a bit."

The Doctor offered her a hand to help her stand. She took it and lurched to her feet, looking around. The TARDIS seemed to be in one piece at least. The lights were flickering on and off, but they were once again clear blue instead of alarming red. A few trails of smoke were leaking out from the beneath the console. "Where are we?"

The Doctor pulled down the view screen but it showed nothing but static interspersed with a few of the curling round symbols she had become so familiar with. She watched as he typed in a few commands into the console.

"Dårlig Ulv-Stranden," he finally answered, the creases in his brow becoming deeper.

"Where's that?"

"Norway."

"All of the that jumping around just to go to Norway?" Clara cried. "I thought you were fixing the turbulence, not making it worse."

The Doctor sighed. "This isn't our Norway. We're in a parallel world."

"What!?"

The Doctor whirled and grabbed her shoulders, putting her face close to his. There was no joy in his eyes now, just worry. "Listen to me Clara. Whoever pulled us here must need my help very badly or they wouldn't have risked destroying two universes to bring me here. Whatever is out those doors, it could be very dangerous."

Clara nodded. "No change there then. It's always very dangerous. I mean you took me to see Robin Hood and we ended up in prison..." she trailed off, suddenly hesitant. "But I thought you said we were going to see your friend?"

The Doctor straightened and grinned at her. "Oh we are!" He fiddled with his jacket and smoothed his eyebrows. "How do I look? Not too rumpled?"

"You look fine," Clara replied confused. She was used to his mood swings but even for him this was bordering on strange.

"Just fine?!"

"Yeah, just fine." Clara snapped, her temper flaring. "You've never much cared what you looked like before. At least not this go around," she conceded.

"Yes well you might want to fix your..." he gestured at her pointing at her head. "It's a bit askew." He tilted his head studying her, "Or maybe it's not."

Clara rolled her eyes smoothing out her hair and straightening out her skirt. "I didn't know this was going to be such a proper visit, would have borrowed the crown jewels," she muttered. "Who are we going to see your ex-girlfriend who lives in a dangerous parallel world or something? That why you need to look nice?" she taunted.

The Doctor pursed his lips and didn't answer just turned and started moving towards the front door. Clara's mouth dropped open."Wait what? Are we really going to see your ex-girlfriend?" She rushed after him nearly colliding into his back as he threw open the TARDIS doors.

They were on a beach. A flat expanse of sand under a pearl gray sky stretched out before them. In the distance she could just make out a crop of dull black rocks. "Bad Wolf Bay," the Doctor muttered stepping out into the sand. Clara followed and shivered as a cold sharp wind rushed into them.

"Bad Wolf?" Clara asked. "It keeps coming up. What does it mean?"

"It's a long story."

"All of your stories are long," she muttered. Clara wrapped her arms around herself to hold in some warmth. "I thought I had heard most of them, but you seemed to have left a few things out."

The Doctor spared her a glance and started walking towards the cluster of rocks, which grew much larger as they trudged trough the sand. He stopped about half there and held out an arm bringing Clara to a halt. "What is it?" she asked.

"Extrapolater shielding. We can't go any farther." He reached out and seemed to touch something solid in midair.

Clara tentatively raised her hand and felt something hard and flat. There was an invisible wall hanging in the middle of the beach. "What do we do now? Can we fly the TARDIS over it?"

"No," The Doctor shook his head.

"Doctor look!" Clara pointed at the rocks as part of them slid apart forming a small door. A tall man emerged and started walking towards them, stopping about ten feet away and allowing Clara to get a good look at him. He appeared to be somewhere around forty with close cropped pale ginger hair. He was wearing a dark wool military style coat, with a high collar, and silver buttons. There were three silver bars emblazoned on the arm.

The Doctor waited while the man studied them as well. His eyes were a warm brown but his expression was shrewd. After looking them both over he pressed a hand to his ear. She watched his mouth move but couldn't hear whatever it was he was saying. The invisible wall must be sound proof as well. The man must have received an answer because half a second later he stepped towards them.

"Doctor?" the man asked sounding just slightly unsure of himself.

The Doctor nodded. "That's me."

"We weren't sure when to expect you or even if we should," the man replied cautiously. "She wasn't sure it would work, or, well, what you would look like."

"Well obviously it worked. But tell me, Commander is it," the Doctor asked eyeing the silver insignia on the man's coat. "Where is Rose Tyler and why exactly has she brought me here?"

The man's mouth twitched just a little curling up into the semblance of a smile. "Always straight to business. My sister is otherwise occupied at the moment Doctor, but it would be my honor to show you around our operation and answer what questions I can."

"Sister?" The Doctor sputtered. Clara watched as the Doctor swept his eyes over the man again, wandering what he was thinking.

"Commander Anthony Tyler with Torchwood sir," the man said giving a sharp salute. "Rose Tyler is my sister."

The Doctor waved his hands in frustration, "No, no, no salutes."

Anthony Tyler smiled, a full smile, this time and Clara mused that he was rather handsome. "She said that you would say that."

"Yes, yes, I'm sure that she did." The Doctor regained a little of his composure. "Tony Tyler! You must be nearing forty."

The Commander nodded, "Forty four come June Doctor, though I don't like to admit it."

"Yes well, that would make Rose nearly seventy."

"I wouldn't mention age to her either Doctor." Anthony replied, his smile fading a little. "Time is a touchy subject in this family."

Clara cleared her throat. The Doctor turned and sort of gestured at each of them impatiently. "Ah yes, Tony Tyler this is Clara. Clara, Tony. Tony, Clara." Introductions over, he promptly took off towards the rocks.

"How do you do ma'am," the Commander smiled and extended his hand to Clara which she took gratefully. "He never really changes does he?"

"No I suppose not," She laughed as they hurried to catch up with the Doctor. "Have you met him before then?"

"In a way."

"In a way? I..." Clara was cut off as they reached the cluster of rocks that Tony had emerged from.

The Doctor had beat them and was busy waving his sonic at the wall in front of him. Tony came up beside him and pressed his hand to his ear once more. "We're ready to come down." A door appeared before them, opening up into a small room, which Clara quickly realized was an elevator. Tony ushered them in with a broad welcoming gesture, "After you."

They all stepped into the small metal lined room, door sliding shut behind them. Clara immediately felt her stomach drop as the elevator lurched downwards quite quickly.

"So Tony, how's your dad, and Jackie?"

Clara looked at the Doctor in surprise. In all of her travels with him, she had never once heard the Doctor inquire about anyone's family, especially in this body. She would have honestly been surprised if he remembered her own parent's names.

"Dad passed but mum's still kicking." Tony grinned, "She'll probably want to see you."

The Doctor cleared his throat looking a little put out. "I'm sure she will. And uhh," he sort of gestured to himself, glancing sidelong at Clara, "where is my counterpart?"

Tony's smile disappeared. "Some things my sister will want to explain."

Clara was thoroughly confused. "Counterpart? What is there another you?" Neither man answered and Clara became even more incredulous. "So now you're telling me there is another you living with your ex girlfriend in a parallel world? Well you have left some things out." The elevator's movement suddenly shifted sideways causing her to sway sharply to the left. The Doctor reached out a hand to steady her but remained silent. "Is this all part of that long story?"

"Yes," he replied brusquely.

The elevator's doors suddenly opened revealing a long dimly lit tunnel. The wall's were made of thick glass. "Are we underwater?" Clara asked in wonder, pressing her hand to the curved surface. It was cold to the touch and she shivered peering out into blue darkness. They were far enough down that very little light was filtering through from the surface.

"Yes we're underwater. Most of the base is built down into the sea floor," Tony answered. They moved past her but Clara lingered a moment longer. She jumped when she thought she saw something flutter past in the dark water. A bright flash of scales and then it was gone leaving Clara a little shaken. She scurried after the other two.

"... It's really the safest place we could find." Clara caught up with them just in time to hear the end of Tony's sentence.

"Safest from what," Clara queried quietly, trailing behind the two men. She didn't get an answer.

"Ah here we are." they came to a large circular door capping the end of the tunnel. Tony pressed his hand into a glowing panel in the center and the door rolled back to reveal a large brightly lit room. "Welcome to Torchwood Doctor, Bad Wolf Division."

The room was domed full of desks, computers, and odd looking equipment that Clara could only guess the use of. There were maybe a dozen people present and all of them had stopped what they were doing to gape openly at the newcomers. Most of them were wearing lab coats but a few were were wearing what Clara thought would pass as uniforms, dark shirts tucked into dark trousers. The Doctor was entirely nonplussed by the attention. Clara watched as he wandered over to a circular pool that was bubbling up into the middle of the room. "What's this for then," he asked loudly walking around the edge. Clara came up beside him but stepped back as a glistening head popped out of the water. Large dark eyes studied the pair of them. Clara's mouth dropped open.

"Is that a mermaid," Clara asked regaining a little bit of her composure. The creature's face was perfectly balanced, large tilted eyes, small almost nonexistent nose, and petite mouth. It's skin was a pearly gray but glimmered like an oil slick under the lights of the room, shattering into a hundred rainbow colors. A delicate network of light blue scales covered it's forehead trailing down to a fanned set of electric blue fins on each side of it's head. A series of gold chains dripped down and twisted back onto each fin.

"They don't call themselves that," Tony replied and then dropped his voice a measure leaning in towards her, "It's actually a bit of insult to them. They've been around much longer then humans and whatever legends we've made up about them." The creature blinked again and Clara watched fascinated as a pair of second eyelids slid across and retracted over it's eyes. "This is Beleti. Her people have no vocal chords. They mainly communicate with hand signals and sometimes telepathy if they feel they have a close bond to you."

Beleti made a series of gestures towards Tony. Clara and the Doctor both watched fascinated as Tony gestured back. "She's asking if you've come to help us Doctor. Her people are the only allies we have left."

"Allies against whom," the Doctor queried a bit of ice creeping into his voice. Clara watched as the Doctor studied the man in front of him again, waiting for a reply. Honestly she could hardly believe that he hadn't thrown a fit yet. Especially after all his railing against Danny and every other soldier they had met in the last few months. Here they were surrounded by soldiers and seemingly in the middle of a war and he had hardly even blinked an eye. Truth be told it was a bit infuriating.

Tony shrugged. "Cybermen don't much like water, though they can be fully immersed for short periods of time."

"Cybermen?" The Doctor was plainly surprised. "I thought you lot had handled that problem long ago." He paused, considering, "You know I don't particularly appreciate being dragged into the middle of a battlefield or a military base. Where is Rose? It's time we had that chat."

Tony had the grace to look slightly abashed. "She left early this morning. We had a message from a refugee enclave near Tokyo that their perception filter had broken down and she went to see if she could help."

"Perception filters don't work on Cybermen," the Doctor replied automatically.

"Perception filters are about the last defense we have, we've had a lot of years to prefect them, make it so they are imperceptible to Cyber scanners." Tony shrugged, "What's left of the human race is hidden in plain sight."

"What's left of the human race? How has it gotten so bad? The last time I checked in on this universe you had the Cybermen completely under control if not completely routed."

Tony shrugged again. "That was over forty years ago Doctor. A lot has changed."

The Doctor opened his mouth to reply but then shut it again as a set of doors across the room slid open and a young woman stepped through. She was tall and lanky with long brown hair, tied into a lose ponytail at the nape of her neck. The ends of her hair had been died an electric blue and a golden hoop pierced her freckled nose. She was wearing a military style jacket very similar to Tony's, but hers only had two silver bars sewn onto the sleeve. She also had a very large gun strapped across her back.

"Hello! We've just returned," the woman proclaimed a little too loudly as she made her way towards them. "Just parked on the lower level and heard we had a visitor so I came up for a look."

"Nova," Tony intoned a warning clear in his voice, throwing a quick glance at the curious people who had gathered around them.

"Don't worry Commander. I've been expressly told to be on my best behavior." The woman stopped in front of them, unstrapping her weapon and letting it drop neatly to the ground. She looked back and forth between Clara and the Doctor before finally settling the weight of her clear hazel gaze on the Doctor. Her lips turned up in a little smirk. "Well hello Dad. Wonderful of you to visit."

Clara watched in shock as the woman, Nova, took a seat in the nearest desk chair and propped her long legs up on the desk, seemingly waiting for a reaction. The Doctor was staring at the woman his face a blank slate, but Clara could practically see the tension radiating from him.

"You do look a bit different though. I'll probably just stick to calling you Doctor," Nova quipped not breaking eye contact.

The Doctor stepped forward and gently tipped the young woman's chin upward studying her face and her hazel eyes. Nova started back defiantly, but after a moment looked away, her jaw clenching. Clara thought she saw a brief flash of sadness flit across her features. "No worry though, I'm only a quarter time-lord. His not yours." The Doctor let go of her chin and she grinned up at him. Her smile didn't reach her eyes. "Mum would like a word though." The woman turned her full attention to Clara, who was still trying to grasp exactly what was going on. Nova's grin grew wider and wilder. "I'll look after your girl for you, show her around, while you two have a chat."

Clara watched stunned and silent as the Doctor just nodded and stalked off towards the door Nova had come through. Anthony Tyler scurried after him.


End file.
